Love is a Battlefield
by Genevieve Darcy Granger
Summary: Lucille may be dead, but she can't move on – not until she dies in battle, in sacrifice for another. Not quite a ghost, but something else, Lucille gave up her right to rest in exchange for protecting her love, Negan.
1. Chapter 1

Lucille was not unfamiliar with death. Her mother died in a car accident when Lucille was only seven years old. The other driver had been drinking, and Lucille's mother had been coming home late from the graveyard shift at the diner. For a long time, it was just Lucille and her father, and their relationship was strained at best and terrible at worst.

The first chance she got to leave, Lucille took it.

Her chance came when the army recruiters came to her high school, promising to pay for college in exchange for service. Lucille agreed, and became a combat medic. Then came 9/11, and Lucille didn't come home for a while.

Lucille's relationship with death became a battle. She tried to save lives more often than she was forced to take them. Either way, she hated all the killings and the death. She hated having the choice of who lived and who died, who was worth the supplies, who could endure the pain to survive rather than live. She hated that more people died in her arms than she cared to count, despite how hard she would try to save them. This wasn't the life for her.

When she came back, she went to nursing school. She wanted to work with babies. Babies were so fresh and new; they were pure and innocent. Besides that, Lucille knew that working with babies would be the closest she could ever come to having one. The reason she came home was because of an injury – a shot clean through her uterus. It was pretty ugly, but Lucille didn't care. She knew it was better to be alive and there were worse injuries to have.

She had met Negan at a used car dealership. Her last car had been a Ford POS, crapped out on her, and she needed a replacement desperately. Negan had been the salesmen, and at first, she thought that his flirting had been just the tactic he used to sell cars. But then, even after she signed, the papers, he hadn't let her alone. "You new around these parts, Lucille?"

"Yeah, I'm attending the nursing school downtown."

"Can I take you out to dinner?" Negan had asked, tongue sliding over bleached white teeth, eyes nearly just as bright.

"Dinner?" Lucille had blinked, confused. She hadn't thought a man as handsome as Negan would look twice at her.

"Well, shit, if you don't want dinner, then how about a movie? Or we could go to the bar?" Gone was the smooth salesman persona and now there was something sincere and genuine. Lucille had seen it in his eyes just how much he was interested in her. She hadn't been sure if it would go beyond a quick fuck, but at the time she hadn't cared.

"Okay, I'll go to dinner with you."

Out of all the decisions she had made in her life so far – leaving home and participating in a war, coming back to put herself through medical school for a grueling job where she knew that not all babies would live – going out with Negan hadn't been her most impetuous thought. But she never regretted saying yes to him.

She said yes to him again when they finally married.

Negan was a good husband. He didn't mind that sometimes she swerved for paper bags in the roads or woke up in a cold sweat, crying out for people that had been gone for a while. Those nights were the worst, but Negan would always make them better. And most importantly, he didn't care that they couldn't have a baby together. Negan not only worked at a car dealership, but he also worked at the local high school and coached basketball. He was with kids all the time – even after school, he'd play ping pong with the neighborhood kids. Negan was of the mind that this was the closest he could get to having kids and that was alright with him. Lucille appreciated that.

In spite of herself, though, Lucille was getting worse. She should have gone to get professional help, but she was too afraid. But being at a hospital only exacerbated her PTSD. She remembered how one day it all came to a head when one of the babies she'd been helping deliver just… just didn't make it. It happened, sometimes, where it is no one's fault, but it happens anyway. The mother could do her best, but death comes no matter what precautions are taken. It was too much for Lucille, and she had to go home because she couldn't bring herself to do anything else.

When Negan came home from work, Lucille lashed out at him for no apparent reason. She didn't even know why either. But she felt irritable and overstimulated and Negan was just being too loud and obnoxious and vulgar – things that used to never bother her before. They argued until Lucille cried and Negan left for the bar.

The next day, he would apologize and Lucille would, too. They danced around Lucille's instability, Negan hinting that she should see someone, Lucille hedging around the fact that she should. But then Lucille would go back to work and the cycle would begin anew. Babies were dying more frequently now and Lucille didn't understand why. There was talk of other things, too, but Lucille barely paid attention to the news anymore. It reminded her too much of when she was a combat medic because all the news talked about was terrorist threats and riots in the streets. And Lucille got much worse as it became harder for her to go to work.

Sometimes she'd just hear a baby scream – a normal sound – and it would take her back to when she'd have to hold down some unfortunate soldier who found a bomb, trying to keep him together as his limbs would fall apart. And then Lucille would blink and she'd realize that she was holding the baby too tightly or that she was about to add too much medicine to the IV bag. When she assisted in labors, the sight of blood – the iron smell of it – nearly made her throw up. The nightmare wouldn't end when she'd go home. Negan brushed tears from her eyes on more than one occasion, tears Lucille hadn't realized were there.

Then there were the phantom pains. Lucille had had her uterus removed, but sometimes she felt like she was still getting the cramps from her period. It used to just be occasional, but now it was nearly every night. Lucille blamed it on her trauma and moved on, downing Tylenol by the bottle as the cramps became too intense – so intense that it was hard for her to move.

And despite all of her medical training, Lucille didn't recognize the signs of cancer when she got it. She let it go too far until it went far past her liver to her gallbladder and stomach and lower esophagus.

Through it all, Negan… Negan had done his best. Before she was diagnosed, he was distant but that was because Lucille had pushed him away. After she was diagnosed, though, he came back and he was patient and hopeful. He actually believed that she could beat this. But Lucille knew that that was unlikely. Sometimes she'd hear things from the nurses – nurses she knew and used to work with – or the TV would be turned on to the news and Lucille would catch snippets about an unusual disease outbreak. At first, she thought it was her imagination, though, and she and Negan didn't talk about it.

Instead they talked about Negan's other women. Lucille hated that that happened, but she couldn't blame him. She was dying. If he wanted to go back to one of them, she couldn't stop it. And if one of those women gave him the family that she never could, then so be it. Lucille even went so far as to encourage it.

"What were they like, Negan? Not broken like me?" It exhausted her to speak, but the words needed to be said.

"Fuck, Lucille, it wasn't like that," Negan argued, concern creasing his forehead. "I just wanted to get my fucking dick wet and you were so frigid." Immediately, he was regretful. "Shit, I didn't mean it like that."

"No, Negan, you're right. I was being frigid. I'm just broken, Negan."

"You're not broken, Lucille. You're the strongest fucking woman I know. You're just sick."

"I was sick before the cancer you know."

"I know." Negan heaved a sigh and covered her cold hand lying limp by her side with his own larger, warmer one. "I love you anyway. I'm just a big piece of shit, Lucille. But you're still too damn good for me."

"Shut up, Negan." Lucille drew a shaky breath. "Now, I need you to find someone else, someone who isn't broken."

"Fuck no. I'm with you."

"Not for long," Lucille reminded him, "Not for long."

"Lucille," he grasped at her hand more firmly, squeezing, imploring her, "Don't leave me all alone, Lucille. Please don't fucking go. Please." Her vision was a little hazy, but Lucille could see the tears drip down his face. "Fucking please, Lucille. Be with me, be with me for fucking ever. Be with me always, baby. Please."

"Negan, I'm so tired," Lucille said, unsure of why she said that. "I feel so heavy. Like lead."

"You can rest, Lucille, but please don't fucking leave me."

Against her will, Lucille's eyes closed.

Lucille had to be dreaming. She was surrounded by white, white ceiling and floor and walls, all glowing. It was as if she was in the center of a star. Now she was no longer hot or cold, or tired for that matter. But she didn't feel lively either. She just was.

"I died," Lucille whispered to herself when she realized. "I just died."

"Lucille," a voice said, a voice Lucille did not recognize. "Lucille, you have died on the battlefield. Glory awaits you."

"I died in a hospital," Lucille corrected the voice. She felt phantom echoes of her PTSD and she had to assure herself what was real, what her memories actually were. The words came out of her in a flood. "I didn't die in Iraq. I was in a hospital in South Carolina. I got out of the war, I got married, I got cancer. I died. I died from cancer."

"Cancer is a battle – your body is the field. You lost the battle, but it was a good fight. You will receive your glory."

"Good fight?" Lucille snorted. Cancer wasn't a fucking boxing match. "I die of cancer so I get to go to Heaven, is that what you're saying? Even though I've killed people, even though I've let so many people die?"

"Heaven is not your glory."

"Damnation is hardly glory. Or purgatory. So, will I be reborn?"

"No," the voice said. "You will be remade."

With that finality, Lucille did feel something again. She felt heat sear her flesh, though it was not painful, and something bloomed from her back. Wings. Lucille knew they were wings, black as her hair.

"I'm an angel? Seriously?"

"A Valkyrie."

Then Lucille burst into light and when the sparkles and dazzles went away, she was suddenly clasped in bronze armor threaded with deadly silver spikes that glittered dangerously. Funny, she couldn't remember what she was wearing before – had she been naked? Despite all the metal, she felt as light as a cloud.

Lifting her hands, sword and shield materialized in her grip. Lucille's hands immediately adjusted to gripping the sword and shield correctly, as effortlessly as she cradled a newborn in the nursery to show the proud father or hefted her gun overseas to aim at a nameless target, a lifetime ago.

She was a Valkyrie now. Briefly, she could remember the stories from that mythology class she took in high school. They were Nordic lesser gods that carried the chosen few from the battlefield to Valhalla. And, if she remembered correctly, they were like the waitresses at Hooters, too, in Valhalla's mead halls. Lucille shook her head at nothing.

"Why?"

"You were a soldier. The world is now a battlefield. You must choose who will survive in the new world to come, or who deserves the eternal rest."

"What about my rest?!" Lucille shouted.

The voice's reply was emotionless. "In due time, Lucille. But you remain whole. They must free you before you are put to rest."

Before Lucille could demand a straightforward answer, the light went out and it was as quick and sudden as falling back into a dreamless sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

When Lucille's eyes opened again they were glazed over and her hand clawed for Negan's face.

But it wasn't her hand. Lucille watched, suspended above herself as her body groaned like some horrible monster and moved with a vitality that wasn't there just an hour or so ago. She hadn't left him, but she was hardly resting now. Unable to interfere, Lucille watched.

Her corpse startled Negan from his nap. He woke up, gasping and crying at the sight of her, falling out of his chair in his haste to get away from her. But Negan didn't leave yet. Lucille's body remained on the bed, restrained there by the bed rails that kept her from accidentally falling out of bed. Negan climbed to his feet, hesitantly approaching her body, and then he actually dipped close and kissed her forehead goodbye.

"Negan," Lucille – the real Lucille whispered. He didn't hear her and ran out the door. Lucille floated down to the floor, staring after him. "Negan." Turning back to her corpse, Lucille reached out and touched the bed. It felt solid under her hand. She reached out and touched her corpse's twitching foot – and her hand phased through. When she quickly jerked her hand back, the foot moved with it, kicking the air violently. "What the hell is this?"

She dragged herself away from her corpse. "Negan! Negan, where are you?"

Negan was gone. Everywhere there were more corpses wandering the streets. When they caught people, they ate them. For a while, Lucille could only watch, horrified. What if her body had done that to Negan? What if it has already happened to him?

Why had she been made a Valkyrie? She was useless. She could scream at people all she wanted to tell them to run, to hide, to get away, but they couldn't hear her. And her sword and shield were useless against the corpses. And even though she had wings, she couldn't fly. She tried, and tried, but she could do nothing. Useless. Lucille should have just died.

Not knowing what else to do, she went home. Negan wasn't there, but all the remnants of their life together was. It was strange being a Valkyrie. No more pain, but she was listless. No hunger, no thirst, no needs. She didn't sleep. This threw Lucille out of sorts. Was this better than being dead?

Rather than haunting her house, staring at wedding photos, and lying awake in their marriage bed – Lucille took to wandering. To keep herself from going crazy, she trailed after people like a puppy. She felt funny doing it, as if she were a parody of a guardian angel cast out of heaven, falling from grace and salvation. But she was lonely so she stayed. Besides, they couldn't sense her.

There was this one ragtag group Lucille found just as they were being surrounded by corpses. She almost walked away, but something inside her told her to stay. Something that felt a lot like purpose. So, she drew her sword and her shield materialized in hand and she charged into the fray to help them. Again, her sword and shield did nothing, but when she accidentally phased through one of the corpses, she noticed it trail after her like a puppet on strings. Her arm lifted and so did the corpse's. When she tried to direct it away, it would not. Frustrated, Lucille dragged it to one of the people with her arms held down at her sides. A man swung his weapon of choice – a fresh and new baseball – right throw Lucille's head to slam into the corpse's temple. It dropped dead for good and Lucille felt like she could breathe.

That felt good, the killing of the dead. It was like being alive again, really alive. Taking an active role did things to Lucille. She went back and snatched more corpses to direct them into weapons. Every time one of the corpses linked to her died, Lucille felt her feet lift off the ground, her wings spreading wide and lifting her into the air without a single flap. Lucille had found the will to live again.

When the last of the corpses fell. Lucille was floating above the ragtag group in near euphoria. Not a single one of the people had gotten bitten or hurt. Survival was possible. She followed them for a while, above them, listening to them talk about their missing loved ones and their rumbling stomachs as they complained for luxuries like pizza and toilets. Lucille missed those things, too.

"I was married once, you know," she told them, though they could not hear her. "My beautiful bad boy biker Negan." Lucille stretched out on her stomach, flying above them like Superman. "He was such a dork. Negan was the kind of guy where we could have a night in playing ping-pong in the garage or we could have a night out shooting pool at the bar. I preferred the night in because at least once I lost, Negan would fuck me on the ping-pong table."

Giggling, Lucille twirled in the air, light as a feather and feeling boneless. It was like she was swimming in the water and defying gravity like this, but she could tell that she was sinking slowly, gradually lower. The high wouldn't stay with her for long. "I didn't like going out either because, well, I don't know if you know this, but I was in a war and I came back all fucked up." She rolled on her back, choosing to stare up at the clouds and wishing she was up there instead of down here. "I guess I shouldn't complain. You all will be fucked up soon enough, too. Survivor's guilt."

Lucille heaved a deep sigh, and suddenly there was screaming. Instinctively, Lucille dropped to the ground feeling as heavy as a sack of bricks. She landed on her feet, sword and shield miraculously in hand again. Scanning around her, she saw one of the stragglers of the groups get snatched by a corpse coming out of the woods. It had already taken a bite out of her. She was as good as dead.

Screaming her grief and anger, Lucille swept her arm out and it passed through the chest of one of the people – a man named Arthur, if she remembered correctly. He didn't even blink at the contact. "Do something!" Lucille shouted in his face, stabbing her sword through his belly that passed harmlessly through, "She's dying! Do something for her!"

Reaching out, Lucille tried to grab his wrist. Arthur was holding a gun limp at his side. Touching him there, of course, did nothing; but Lucille's fingertips brushed against the pistol, and she felt magnetized to it. Instincts of being a soldier on the battlefield flooded her again, and instead of being consumed by her PTSD, Lucille felt none of that as she forced Arthur to raise the gun. She made him aim it at the straggler and the corpse. She made him pull the trigger.

The straggler stopped screaming and dropped the ground, dead and gushing blood that steamed in the cold morning air.

The corpse dropped with the straggler's corpse and plunged its bony fingers in the soft stomach until it yielded intestines.

Horrified, Lucille screamed again, her cries joining those of the people behind her. Her feet sunk into the ground as if her combat boots were made of cinderblocks. "You were supposed to shoot the corpse! I didn't do that! You did that!"

Lucille made the gun point at the corpse and she made Arthur shoot again. This time the mark was true and now there were two bloody corpses on the ground. But they didn't stop screaming, and while Lucille didn't feel so heavy anymore, she had not lifted even an inch off the ground. In her selfishness, she had failed. Never again.

To prevent loss of life again, Lucille took to practicing with her newfound abilities. People who were alive had free will and it prohibited Lucille from taking control of their bodies. Corpses were fair game, but controlling their bodies took a lot of effort. Lucille was a Valkyrie, not a ghost. Possession just wasn't possible.

Even with objects, Lucille could only control weapons, and even then, only if they were in the hand of the living. If the living used something unconventional as a weapon, Lucille could help, too, but it was harder for her. Her powers were so damn temperamental; Lucille didn't understand any of it.

One thing she did know was that for every person that died while she did nothing for them, she sunk. Lucille was so afraid, afraid that that meant she was being dragged to hell. But when she saved people and protected people, she floated. Somehow, though, Lucille doubted that meant she was going to heaven anytime soon.

There were flaws in this system, though. Sometimes people deserved to die and were not meant for this world, either because they were weak or because they were cruel. Those were the moments that Lucille hated the most. Someone in the group tried to steal food and when confronted, they held someone else hostage. The man with the baseball bat tried to talk the man down – Arthur, Lucille knew. But she could tell by that look in his eye that he was not to be swayed. And Lucille didn't want the death of that young man he threatened with a gun to be on her. She grabbed the bat before she even knew what she was doing.

It felt good when Arthur died, and Lucille was raised off the ground a full foot. Staring down at Arthur – or rather his lifeless corpse that would stay immobile – Lucille shook her hand. "You're not meant for this world, and I don't think you're meant for heaven either." It didn't leave much else for Arthur to go, but Lucille didn't care. She doubted that he'd become a Valkyrie.

But that was something Lucille had yet to encounter. Other Valkyrie. Sometimes she wondered if this was a private punishment or maybe other Valkyrie were invisible to each other or Valkyrie were assigned to areas that way there wouldn't be any overlap with each other. Or maybe there weren't enough Valkyrie in the world to protect everyone. Lucille only hoped that wherever Negan was – and he was alive and she wanted to believe that so much for it be to true – there was a Valkyrie watching over him.

There was one occasion, though, where Lucille discovered a new ability. Not only did she have the power to damn people, or to bless them with heaven, but she could make other Valkyrie. This woman in the group, Angela, and out of all of them, Lucille knew she was a liability. She didn't have the fighting spirit – she scrapped to survive – but she didn't want to live. In this world, there was a difference between survival and living. Lucille knew that well. As it was, Lucille knew she was only surviving out of fear, doing her job because that was the role she was given. There was no relish in doing it, though.

One day, Angela had sequestered herself away in her tent, and as Lucille walked the perimeter checking for threats, she heard screams. Immediately, Lucille sprinted for the camp and phased through the crowd gathered around Angela's tent. Angela had cut herself deep on one arm going up her forearm from wrist to elbow. Blood gushed and seeped around her. Lucille dropped to her knees and a heavy weight settled in the souls of her feet. Angela was the first person to die after Arthur; Lucille thought she had been doing a good job. Numbly, she listened to the group talk around her.

"Angela, you know that, you know we can't help you," Sherry said. Lucille didn't care much for her. Sherry was selfish, and hoarded supplies. The group knew that Angela wanted to die, and Sherry had been of the mind that if that was the case they shouldn't share their supplies with Angela. "We don't have enough supplies to waste – to use on you to save you. It's too late."

A ripple went through the crowd, but no one had the balls to openly disagree with Sherry. There were all survivors just getting by. They needed a leader; as it was, Sherry's husband Dwight was a makeshift husband. He had to do. But Dwight was out hunting right now. Lucille thought he'd be fine by himself. Besides, he was hunting with a crossbow, and Lucille did better with melee weapons. She particularly favored knives or that bat.

Angela's voice was soft when she answered. "It's okay. I'm ready to die. Tired, so tired."

Lucille lifted her head, familiarity and power coursing through her veins.

"You'll... you're going to turn, Angela," Sherry continued.

"Just, leave me here. Zip up the tent, leave a sign. I won't hurt anybody." Angela was a simpleminded woman. Lucille shook her head. But they did as she asked. Angela was confined to her tent and left to turn. Sherry said that when Dwight returns, they'd eat and sleep, but leave in the morning. Lucille had half of mind to drag the man – no one called his name – by the bat in here to finish the job, but she stayed with Angela instead, watching her die.


	3. Chapter 3

Angela wept quietly to herself, and Lucille couldn't tell if it was from pain, relief, or fear. She stopped crying when she stopped breathing, and Lucille was nearly suffocating from the iron stench of blood. Old war instincts cropped up in her mind, told her to be alert, to go out there and protect the living. But some feeling that was older than that – ancient even – told her to stay and wait. Angela's corpse twitched.

Crawling forward, Lucille laid her hand across Angela's forehead. "You're not finished yet. The battle isn't over. You don't get to leave yet." Almost bitterly, Lucille added under her breath, "You should have asked them to kill you, Angela."

And then Angela the Valkyrie was staring Lucille in the eyes. "What?"

At first Lucille only stared at Angela, taking in how this woman's armor was different. It was pure white, almost ghostly, and trimmed in gold that matched her wings. Lucille almost hated her armor in comparison; almost. "You're a Valkyrie, Angela."

"That's what he – it – she – they – whatever told me." Angela was taking it surprisingly well.

"What else did you learn?"

"The rules." Angela's brow furrowed. "How it works. But… I don't know why."

Lucille's lip curled, jealous that this woman didn't have to flail in the dark like she did. "I don't know why either."

Angela reached out and touched Lucille's shoulder comfortingly. "It's okay. I know what I have to do."

Both Valkyrie rose to their feet. "You won't stay here."

"No," Angela agreed, eyes flicking towards her corpse on the ground. The eyes were open now, staring into nothing. "We can't be around our bodies for too long."

Narrowing her eyes at Angela, Lucille bitterly asked, "Anything else he told you?"

"Every Valkyrie is different, Lucille. He said don't be angry at me for that."

Lucille shoved Angela hard and it felt good to have her hands connect with something solid. Touch starved, Lucille shoved Angela again until there were both outside the tent, cool air whistling through their armor that glowed in the light of the campfire and stars. "Get out of here! These people are mine!" Lucille turned away before she could draw her sword against Angela. "I need to make sure they don't stumble in your tent by mistake. I need to keep them alive."

She didn't wait to see if Angela would leave. Instead, Lucille tapped the man with the baseball bat, linking herself to his weapon. He stood and they walked the perimeter together. Dwight had already come back, and they were eating rabbits together, pretending that Angela's corpse was growling in her tent. Once everyone else had gone to bed, Lucille made the man with the bat go in there and put Angela down.

That felt too good to do.

They left the next morning, and no one confronted the man with the bat about what he did, but Lucille knew that they knew. Unable to fly, Lucille walked among them. She wished she knew the area better if only so she could try to lead them somehow, but Lucille was never an outdoorsman. Unlike before, now when they traveled they were completely silent, afraid that talking might lure out more corpses.

But Lucille didn't have to be afraid of being heard, and she talked to them freely. "I died," she announced to them, bumping her shoulder against the man's with the bat. She phased right through him and quickly corrected herself before she could fall over. "I died from cancer and I became this to protect people like you."

Lucille looked around her, scanning the faces of the people she's chosen to protect and the surrounding area for corpses. "I should have stayed with Negan to protect him, but he could be dead now. My Negan is strong, though. He wouldn't die. He'd make it. He was always stronger than me."

There was silence as Lucille let her words hang in the air. Then she continued, "He was stronger than me because I was broken. I know I was broken." She swung her sword, shifting her shield in her grip. "I don't think I'm broken anymore. All the blood in this world doesn't bother me anymore like it should." Lucille shook her head. "Survival means desensitizing, I remember."

Staring ahead, she watched how Dwight and Sherry lead the group. They were walking side by side, but apart from each other, too, with an obvious gap between them. Lucille snorted and pushed forward until she was standing between them. "You two aren't in love, not like Negan was with me. Now that was real love. He did everything for me. He put up so much of what I did, and I did the same for him. Negan had other women, and I turned a blind eye. I let him have them. I wanted him to leave, but he never did because he knew that I wanted him to stay with me more."

Glancing to her left at Sherry and then glancing to her right at Dwight, Lucille sighed. "I know true love when I see it. It's pure. It goes beyond this life, I'm sure of it. Your love isn't real. I know love, and it's a battlefield. You fight for it all your life, and you have it, you fight to keep it. And you fight with each other." Smirking, Lucille said to herself, "You don't just make love with each other, you make war."

Her words fell on deaf ears, and Lucille wasn't sure if she knew what she was saying anymore.

Time passed, though, how much time Lucille couldn't be sure. No sleep made all the days blend together, and Lucille became obsessed with protecting this small group that she had. They were walking by a farm, picturesque in its beauty at the end of the world as though it was untouched, when Lucille heard something. She was still walking, unable to fly, and on alert she drew her sword and shield and dashed ahead.

Hidden by a copse of trees was a tall man taking a piss. Lucille didn't drop her guard; she knew people could be a threat, too. She waited for her group to catch up, lifting her hand and making Dwight aim the crossbow. "Who the hell are you?"

The man cocked his head, but didn't turn around, waiting until he was finished. It made Lucille crack a smile in spite of herself. "Damn, a guy can't take a fucking piece without being threatened?"

Familiarity stirred in her heart.

Turning around finally, after he tucked himself away, Lucille was staring her husband in the face. He looked exactly the same if only a little thinner and a light dusting of stubble. But he was healthy and… happy, which was more than Lucille could hope for. Negan smiled, and Lucille breathed out his name, "Negan."

Negan held out his hand to Dwight, "Hi, I'm Negan."

Lucille rushed to Negan and leaped at him, expecting him to catch her. Instead she phased right through his body and her wings flapped to keep herself from falling. She was flying now, floating high, and she twirled and swirled around Negan, infatuated.

"You're okay, Negan, you're alive. I've missed you, I love you." Lucille reached out to hold his hand, to grasp his chin, to put her palm over his sternum and feel his heartbeat. Her fingertips tingled as she phased through him, and her heartbeat fluttered all the same as if she was really touching him. "I won't leave you again, Negan, I promise. I'll protect you with my life. Everyone else can die except you, baby, all except you."

She clung to him as much as she could, eyes only for him as Dwight made a face and politely refused Negan's hand. They offered him a chance to join the group, Sherry the one to make the proposal, eyes wide and thoughtful. Lucille didn't notice, enjoying Negan's warm look in return, believing it was only for her, though, he reacted to none of her touches so far. Negan took up the rear of the group as they moved along, trailing after the man with the bat.

"Nice bat," Negan complimented.

"Thanks," the man grunted.

Lucille only heaved a deep sigh of love.

Since Negan joined, Lucille neglected her other duties. She didn't accompany anyone other than him, didn't patrol the campsite, didn't keep an eye out on anything. Negan's weapon of choice was a knife, and Lucille wished she could use her powers to caress it lovingly as a means of ingraining herself closer to Negan. He had become a new temptation for her, something else that drove her wild. Lucille was sure that she was going crazy now, Negan always out of her reach.

For now, she could tolerate it, but then one night while Lucille sat in Negan's tent while he slept, feigning that his head was resting on her lap rather than the pillow, Sherry unzipped Negan's tent and slipped inside. Immediately, Lucille pulled her sword and grasped for Negan's knife. She didn't trust Sherry a bit.

"Negan," Sherry cooed and ran her hand over his chest.

"Sherry," Negan woke up and though Lucille eagerly shook the knife, Negan never reached for it. "You finally ready to get fucked by a real man?"

Lucille shook with rage and helplessly watched. She pushed her way out of the tent, unable to interfere. She felt like the ground was going to swallow her up – she wanted the ground to swallow her whole.

Still able to hear Sherry's muffled moans and Negan's quiet, familiar grunts, Lucille went to the man with the bat and sat guard by the lowlight of the campfire. Dwight was on perimeter control tonight, Lucille knew. Sherry wouldn't have dared enter the tent otherwise. Lucille felt cold as ice, like she corpse she knew she was.

The next morning, Sherry sidled up to Dwight's side during breakfast, and Dwight shared half his food with her even though Sherry already ate her share. Lucille burned with rage.

It was not a one-time experience. Habitually, Sherry carefully divided her time between Dwight and Negan. Lucille became acclimated to it, and eventually it didn't bother her anymore. If anything, she thought back to when Negan had his other women. Lucille was dead; she couldn't satisfy his needs anymore, this would have to do. All Lucille could do was watch out for him.

However, if she cared less about Sherry's safety, then so be it. But Sherry hardly needed Lucille's protection when she had both Dwight and Negan looking out for it. It made Lucille's heavy stomach churn, but at night she satisfied herself by lying over Sherry's body, pretending it was just her and Negan doing what lovers do. Every morning, Lucille was left more bereft than before, shameful and most of all feeling stupid and crazy for thinking that Negan would still pledge himself to her.

Then one day, this little group fell into the hands of another group. At first there was nothing to fear, and the people clamored to camp together believing safety in numbers. In the middle of the night, though, Lucille stroked Negan's forehead and nearly leaned down to try and kiss him when gunshots rang out. Both she and Negan ran out of the tent, and there the man with the bat was dead, and the new group had one of their women on her back.

Lucille knew what was happening. Negan did, too. He flew into a rage and tackled one man to the ground. "You fucking animals! You raping pigs! You want to fuck someone? How about you try and fuck with me?"

Adrenaline flooded Lucille and she rose off the ground. "Kill them, Negan. Kill them so I can damn them. Men like that aren't men. They don't deserve to live." And as soon as Negan took up the dead man's bat, Lucille felt like she came alive. She imbued herself in the bat and helped him swing true and hard. Skulls cracked and the iron blood refreshed her rather than terrified her. Lucille wanted to laugh at the irony that it took death for her to grow into something not broken anymore. Instead she made Negan swing again and again. She wanted more.

After that, Negan became firmly established as the leader and Sherry officially left Dwight. Lucille was proud of Negan, and when Negan took some barbed wire from the fence they were camping by to wrap around the weapon, Lucille fell in love with him more. He would whisper to the bat and croon loving things. "Lucille, my beautiful girl," he'd say, "you make my dick hard, baby girl." She was enraptured watching him rut his erection against the handle of the bat, and when he came she could've sworn that she did, too.

Soon Negan established a community at an abandoned factory he affectionately dubbed The Sanctuary. His men were the Saviors. Lucille considered herself to be the angel on the battlefield as Negan's Valkyrie. He had a knife and iron that he used for punishments, but Lucille had no need to be jealous. He used the bat he named after her to execute his opponents. Every time he did that Lucille would soar higher, feeding off their damnation. By now her feet never touched the ground anymore and she was in a state of near bloodlust constantly. It felt too good and so much like being alive. She relished it; and she was proud of that man Negan became in order to keep others alive. In her heart of hearts, Lucille could relate.


	4. Chapter 4

"Let's meet the man."

Negan hopped out of the RV, and Lucille dutifully followed, hand resting on the bat on his shoulder. She let herself be tugged along by him, reclining in the air as she swept her passive gaze over the semi-circle of kneeling people. People. If they could even be called that. An entire outpost wiped out in their sleep? People don't do that. Well, in this world they do.

Watching and listening, Lucille narrowed her eyes, wondering which one should be picked for her. She wanted someone worthy, someone satisfying. The big fucker looked like the best option. Lucille didn't much care for the blood of women and children. But that redheaded bastard, there was something about him. He had a familiar air about him.

"Eeny…meeny…miney…mo." Negan began his game. Lucille let herself be swung about, but the never looked away from the redhead. That was the one she wanted. Once Negan neared the end of his rhyme, Lucille tugged the bat toward the redhead. The intent would be unmistakable.

And Negan picked him.

"If anybody moves, cut the boy's other eye out and feed it to his father," Negan said. "You can breathe. You can blink. You can cry. Hell, you're all going to be doing that."

Lucille placed her hands over Negan's and helped him heft the bat high in the air. They both brought it down with a crack, Negan breathing heavily and Lucille laughing. It was easier than cracking eggs, and Lucille ducked down to smell the blood. The iron scent was as equal parts intoxicating as it was energizing.

Behind her, Lucille could hear Negan crack a joke like he cracked this redhead's skull – but the redhead had a better come back. "Suck my nuts!"

Snorting, Lucille was already tugging the bat back up. They weren't finished yet.

After Negan had flattened the man's head into the ground and started his taunting again, Lucille knelt over the man's body. She sensed there was something…something lingering.

And then she knew because suddenly the redhead stood before her in burnished gold armor. His wings matched his hair; blood red fading to orange. Lucille rose to stand eye to eye with him. For a moment they were locked together like that, and then the redhead spoke. "You and I are going to be seeing a lot more of each other."

"Not for long."

The redhead's mustache bristled, but then their attention was diverted back to Negan. That redneck slugged him in the face. Lucille immediately flew to his side and imbued herself in the bat, encouraging him to lift it against him, to get some damn revenge. Negan resisted, and Lucille almost flew to Dwight to make him pull the trigger; but then she saw how Negan tipped the bat like a compass toward the Asian. Lucille immediately understood.

She made eye-contact with the redhead as she encouraged Negan to lift the bat. "No exceptions!"

The redhead rushed her and tackled Lucille to the ground, but Negan finished the job easily without her help. Lucille wrestled with the redhead for a while until someone pulled the redhead off – it was the Asian, in blacken armor streaked with silver. His wings were white. "No, Abraham! We've got to do something now for them, we have to help them."

"You can't," Lucille spat and she almost felt like she was spitting blood. "These people are mine. So long as I'm alive, they are, too."

"Why didn't we have a Valkyrie on our side?"

"I don't know." Lucille rose up, keeping her eye on Negan kneeling next to their leader. "You might have had a Valkyrie, but they probably already died for you."

"Your time will come, too," said the Asian – Glenn – as he pointed his finger at Lucille.

But Lucille only laughed at him. They spent the rest of the night fighting for control. When Negan and Rick went on their trip, Abraham accompanied Lucille. He pushed Rick to raise the hatchet at Negan, but Lucille made Negan raise the machine gun back. Then Abraham pushed Negan's machine gun around so that he wouldn't shoot Rick. Lucille watched and cackled. She knew Negan's true intentions.

When they got back, Glenn and Abraham watched as Negan forced Rick to raise his axe at Carl. None of them dared to touch the blade. But then Negan started counting and Glenn rushed forward. Lucille did, too. They struggled like that for a while until Negan made Rick drop it.

While Negan made his speech, Lucille made hers to the other Valkyrie. "You're going to die for these people because you love them. You love them all so much. All of them. That is your mistake."

"And don't you love him?" Glenn said.

"Only him. The rest don't matter."

"That's your mistake," Abraham said.

Lucille only shook her head, and left with Negan. He could never be her mistake.

The next time she saw them again was when she and Negan went to visit their community Alexandria. _Mercy for the weak, vengeance for the plunderers._ Lucille smiled at the pretty words. Negan passed the bat to Rick, and Lucille tugged it down hard so that it weighed heavy in his grip. Abraham met her at the gate, and it felt weird for Lucille to be visible again.

"Adjusting to this new life?" She teased.

"I know how to point a gun," Abraham said gruffly.

Lucille hummed thoughtfully and they walked side by side tensely in Negan and Rick's shadow. "You were a soldier before, weren't you?"

"Sergeant Abraham Ford."

"Combat Medic, myself," Lucille admitted. It felt strange to talk so much and have answer, to confess and have her confession be heard. She wasn't sure if she cared so much for it now.

"You're his wife." Abraham wasn't asking.

"Yes, Sergeant. Or, at least, I was." She slid her eyes over to him. "I died before all this. Cancer. Negan had no time to mourn before he was plunged into hell."

"And you were made a Valkyrie to help him?"

"It never told me why I was made a Valkyrie." Lucille shot Abraham a glare. "And you?"

After a pause, Abraham admitted, "It told me that I wouldn't be a Valkyrie for long, but neither would you."

"Why?"

"You weren't doing your job anymore."

"Says who?"

"It. God. Whatever the shit."

Disbelieving, Lucille scoffed, "If that is God, I don't care to see Heaven."

"After what I've seen, honey, you don't have to worry about Heaven."

Wryly, Lucille smirked, but then there were interrupted as the priest led to them to fresh graves. Lucille stood right on top of one, thoughtfully staring at the dirt clinging to the priest's black pants. "Where is the other Valkyrie?"

"Glenn's not here."

"No, he wouldn't be. It hurts to be near your bodies. I imagine, you're not buried here." Flicking her eyes over to Negan, as watchful as a hawk when it comes to his safety, Lucille briefly glanced back at Abraham. "Neither is Glenn's widow."

Abraham said nothing. He didn't have to. Instead, he countered her, "Doesn't it make your cunt itch to hear your husband talking about fucking some other pussy?"

"My cunt only itches after he uses that bat to bash in some poor fuck's brain," Lucille shot back defensively. What he said hit too close to home for her and she didn't like it. She shifted from foot to foot from the cognitive dissonance. "The itch goes away when he wipes the blood away, cooing how much he still loves me."

"I was married from before, too." Abraham said flatly. "She died. It was my fault. But I still found someone else to love. And after her, someone better. It's like I told her; you're not the only woman in the world."

Before Lucille could retaliate, a gunshot rang through the air. They both followed the noise to the one-eyed kid from before. Lucille shook her head and turned to Abraham who was staring at the kid – Carl – fondly. "You say you can control guns now? Other weapons?"

"I've been practicing."

Tilting her head at her husband, Lucille said, "Negan figured as much. Well…" She trailed off and gestured to Negan again.

"That reminds me that your people have a shitload of our guns," Negan said to Rick. And Lucille smiled gleefully.

When Lucille left with Negan, it was with all their guns. Negan took the bat from Rick's grip, and Lucille immediately lightened the load, chuckling when Negan growled one last inappropriate comment in his ear. She didn't say a word to Abraham and didn't look back.

Abraham's ominous warning that she wouldn't be around for long had been weighing heavily on Lucille's mind. She took to walking with Negan now, slipping her hand with his to hold the bat together. Lucille wasn't ready to leave him yet, and more importantly, she didn't think he'd be ready to let her go either. He still hasn't despite drowning himself in pussy. The goddamn bat was named after her, for Christ's sake. Some night he still rutting against the handle and called her name. This was love, real love worth fighting for. It didn't matter that she was dead.

The day Carl came to the Sanctuary, though, Lucille genuinely feared for her life. He could have shot Negan, he could have done it. She had tried to move the gun away, to point it somewhere else, but the kid's control was strong. All she could do was stay the trigger. Then Negan had gone and offered the kid a damn tour as if he were Willy goddamn Wonka. And he had forgotten the bat.

Lucille clung to his back, eyeing the kid. She tried to tilt her head, to dive inside Negan as if she could see things from his perspective. But nothing. Carl being here put Negan in danger, and Lucille's skin crawled with the discomfort. Negan made Carl sing to the bat – to her – but Lucille wasn't pleased. She sat across from Carl, Negan swinging the bat distractingly, and Lucille felt nothing but dread.

The dread wouldn't go away, either. They drove Carl home, Lucille sitting across Negan's lap with her wings hanging out the window and enjoying the breeze. She kept her eyes glued to Carl the whole time.

Back at Alexandria, Negan lingered, waiting for Rick, Carl's father. Lucille was on edge. Abraham was gone, and Lucille wondered if he was following Rick. But there was something in the air, she was sure of it. Negan was cooking spaghetti happily, and all Lucille could think of was the million and one ways this could go wrong.

The only thing that abated her anxiety was seeing Negan coo over a baby. At first it made Lucille feel warm and fuzzy, remembering the joys of cradling an infant. Then she'd remember how she could never give Negan a baby and she was desolate again tenfold. When he rocked Judith in his lap on the porch and called her an angel, Lucille was sure she was going to die. But she didn't. And this felt ten times worse than watching him fuck his wives into the mattress.

When Spencer came over and invited Negan to play pool, Lucille had not marginally relaxed an inch. She spent the entirety of dinner sitting rigidly in the chair, smelling the spaghetti and fresh rolls and feeling sick to her stomach. She'd rather smell blood. Lucille sat in the middle of the pool table while Spencer and Negan played. Half-listening to their conversation, Lucille rolled around on her stomach, watching the Alexandrians gather around. Eventually, she saw Abraham walk up with one of the girls from the lineup, a Latina. Lucille climbed to her feet when she saw him, ready for a fight. He looked too pleased with himself.

Negan's voice raised in pitch, and Lucille could tell what that meant. Time to show her power. She jumped down beside Negan, sliding her hand seductively over his belly to where he kept his knife. They'd never see a knife coming. Lucille was right. Spencer's guts spilled all over the asphalt and splashed on Negan. The crowd rippled with horror and fear, gasping and quaking; and Lucille and Negan basked in the attention and iron stench of blood.

"Anyone wanna finish the game?" Negan gloated, pointing the bat at the crowd. Lucille had a finger on the tip, helping him hold it steady. She and Abraham glared daggers at each other. "Come on, I was winning!"

Abraham was so distracting that Lucille didn't notice the Latina raise her gun until she had already pulled the trigger. War instincts – from Lucille's time and from Valkyrie time – reared its ugly head and Lucille pushed the bat up with her finger to block the bullet. It worked; it shouldn't have worked but it did. Negan was alive. Lucille tossed a smile towards Abraham, but then, warmth bloomed in her heart and it hurt. She looked down.

There was a bullet hole in her armor, pulsing hot red blood that smelled metallic.

"I told you," Abraham began, not pitying her in the slightest, "You are gonna die."

Lucille placed a hand over her heart, watching everything happen in slow motion. Negan roared in rage. Arat tackled the Latina down in the street. Negan moaned how she would never be beautiful again. Lucille felt pain, cried tears, felt human again. Her black feather fell off her back like autumn leaves and withered in the street as wispy as smoke.

Negan said, "Lucille…Give me strength."

Dropping to her knees, Lucille nodding at him in earnest. "Yes, Negan, have it. Have it all. All my love and strength, my love."

Then time sped up and Negan ordered Arat to kill someone. Abraham shouted and jerked Arat's gun up away from the Latina. The bullet hit Olivia and Abraham shouted angrily again.

Where she was lying in the street between Spencer's corpse and the Latina's prone body, Lucille laughed until she coughed up blood. "You lied. You haven't been practicing at all."

"Shut up and die already."

"I am," Lucille said, "I am. I'm just so tired. It's taking me awhile." Her eyes fell shut. "I've only died once before, you know."

"I know."

"Yes, you do." With a tremendous amount of effort, Lucille opened her eyes one last time and looked up at Negan and his smooth baby face. She couldn't remember the last time he shaved. Maybe from before when she was still alive. "I love you, Negan. So much."

And then she died on the battlefield again. While she wasn't ready to die, Lucille was much happier dying this time if only because she this time she died for love.


End file.
